See also page 65

Retinal detachment is an uncommon condition. At the most, 10% of all detachments are attributable to previous injury. Such detachments are not due to bumps or blows to the head but result from direct force applied to the eye resulting in deformation of the globe. An increasing number of trauma induced retinal detachments result from sports injuries and represent a greater proportion of complex detachments such as those with associated giant retinal breaks. Not uncommonly other factors play a part in the development of the detachment such as myopia. In many sports, serious injury is the consequence of foul play such as thumbing injuries in boxing as well as other forms of eye gouging as in the reported case. Outlawing certain types of play by simply highlighting their occurrence or legislative action can do much to prevent these sight threatening injuries.